# How to make a pillow of your house URL: https://madeupmerch.jackmccarthy020.workers.dev/how-to/make-a-pillow-of-your-house/ Updated: 2026-10-23 One photo of the front of the house becomes a drawing, and the drawing becomes a pillow shaped like the roofline. **Short answer:** Take a photo of the outside of the house with nobody in it, have it redrawn as a cut-out illustration, and sew the pillow along that outline with a thick white border. On Home Sweet Pillow it comes in 10, 16 or 22 in, and the same drawing makes die-cut stickers and magnets. ## Take the photo the drawing needs The roof is the cut line, so get the whole roof in the frame. Stand far enough back that the chimney, the gables and both corners of the house are in the shot. The illustrator copies what it can see, so a photo that crops off the porch gets a house without a porch. Keep people out of it. [Home Sweet Pillow](https://madeupmerch.jackmccarthy020.workers.dev/house/) refuses any photo with a person in it, even an old family snapshot on the porch, and anything whose main subject isn't the outside of a home. A photo of three houses in a row is fine. A photo of your dog in front of the house is a photo of a dog. ## Check the count before it draws Before anything is drawn, an inspector (a quick AI pass over the photo) counts what's there: floors, front windows, doors, porch, chimneys, garage, the roof and the colours. You can correct those numbers. Do it, because the drawing follows the count. The known gotcha: the drawing sometimes adds a chimney that isn't there. If your house has no chimney, make sure the count says zero. House numbers are left off on purpose, and so are cars, signs and flags in the yard. ## Pick a style - **Storybook**: gouache and coloured pencil, warm light, a dark brown outline. The closest to a picture book. - **Tiny Model**: the house as a little handmade model of painted wood and clay, seen from a three-quarter view so one side shows. - **Risograph**: flat spot inks matched to the house's own colours, with grain and a slightly off-register look. On a white house it has come out mostly as line art, because white walls read as bare paper. Try Storybook if yours is white. ## Add a banner, or a gift note Under the house you can add a banner of up to 24 characters, like THE OKAFORS or EST. 2026, in cream, red, navy, green, gold or black. If it's a present, there's a gift option for a housewarming, a closing, an anniversary or no reason at all. Your greeting and a note of up to 180 characters go on the packing slip, and the slip shows no prices, so it can ship straight to them. ## What happens to the photo This is the one pillow where the photo has to leave your phone early, because the illustrator has to see the house. Nothing is sent until you tick the consent box and press send. Location and camera data are stripped on the phone first. You can delete the photo and every drawing made from it from the site. Otherwise it's removed 90 days after upload. One catch: the drawing can only be ordered from the browser that sent the photo, so make it on the device you'll check out on. ## Questions people ask ### Can I make a pillow of a house that isn't mine? The consent box asks you to confirm it's your house or that the owner said yes. For a closing gift, ask the buyers for a photo or use one they've shared with you. ### Will my house number show? No. Numbers are dropped from the drawing on purpose, so the pillow doesn't print an address. ### Why does my pillow have a chimney? The drawing sometimes adds one. Set the chimney count to zero before it draws, and draw again if it still sneaks in. ### Can I get stickers of the house too? Yes. The same drawing is cut as a die-cut sticker or fridge magnet in 3, 4 or 6 in. ## Or just make one - [Home Sweet Pillow](https://madeupmerch.jackmccarthy020.workers.dev/house/): A photo of a house becomes a pillow cut along its roof. - [The Skyline](https://madeupmerch.jackmccarthy020.workers.dev/skyline/): Drop a pin. Get a pillow shaped like the mountains you see from there.